Charles Ellicott Commentary Leviticus 25:21

"then I will command my blessing upon you in the sixth year, and it shall bring forth fruit for the three years." — Leviticus 25:21 (ASV)

Then I will command my blessing. That is, He will send out His Divine command to the soil in the sixth year that it should be a blessing to them, and it will be done. (Psalms 42:8; Psalms 44:4; Psalms 68:29.)

It shall bring forth fruit for three years. —Better, it shall bring forth produce. This special blessing will be manifested in the abundant crop of the harvest preceding the sabbatical year. Just as at the institution of the weekly Sabbath, when God enjoined abstention from labour, He sent down a double portion of manna every sixth day to make up for the day of rest (Exodus 16:22–27), so He will exercise a special providence every sixth year by blessing the soil with a treble crop to compensate for giving the land a septennial sabbath.

As the sabbatical year began the civil year, namely, 1 Tishri, which was in the autumn or September, the three years spoken of here are to be distributed as follows:

1. The remainder of the sixth year after the harvest;
2. The whole of the seventh year; and
3. The period of the eighth year until the harvest is gathered in from the seeds sown in the eighth year.

Thus, it will be seen that the question anticipated in Leviticus 25:29, namely, “What shall we eat the seventh year?” properly applies to the eighth year, since the requirements for the seventh year are supplied by the regular harvest of the sixth year, and it is the eighth year for which the harvest of the seventh is wanted.

To meet this difficulty, one of the most distinguished Jewish expositors of the Middle Ages translates Leviticus 25:20: “And if ye shall say in the seventh year ‘What shall we eat’” that is, in the eighth year.

It may, however, be that the question expresses the anxiety the people might feel when eating their ordinary share in the seventh year, fearing that nothing would be left for the eighth year. This anxiety arises because in all other years, the harvest for the next year is ripening while the fruits of the past year are being consumed.